The Ten Biggest Lies in Audio
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internet radio
pfm Member
sorry my mistake. Thanks for telling me.
I've seen this before and the only point the article makes is that because we can't scientifically measure something, the writer pours scorn on the hearing of those who choose to follow certain paths. He speaks for no-one but himself and those who choose not to hear or for that matter, even listen with any degree of diligence.
If the points made were to be believed then all amplifiers, solid state or otherwise, would sound exactly the same, much along the lines of Peter Walker's 'straight wire with gain' hypothesis.
There are many things that even the most arrogant scientist cannot understand - dark matter and dark energy for instance. Mathematical calculations suggest the reality of such substances but so far, explanation has eluded even the sharpest brains.
If the points made were to be believed then all amplifiers, solid state or otherwise, would sound exactly the same, much along the lines of Peter Walker's 'straight wire with gain' hypothesis.
There are many things that even the most arrogant scientist cannot understand - dark matter and dark energy for instance. Mathematical calculations suggest the reality of such substances but so far, explanation has eluded even the sharpest brains.
Patrick Dixon
Imagineer
It's not 'audio' it's musical reproduction - and that involves human perception.
If you can explain why one person likes a piece of music whilst another one hates it, then I'll happily concede that we know everything we need to.
If you can explain why one person likes a piece of music whilst another one hates it, then I'll happily concede that we know everything we need to.
sergeauckland
pfm Member
Audio is a science, music is the art. We tend to confuse the two. There's precious little we don't know about how audio equipment works at the technical level. There may be things we don't understand about human perception, but that has nothing to do with getting signals into and out of bits of electronic equipment. That's been well understood for a very long time.
S.
Robert
Tapehead
It says and implies nothing of the sort.
Werner
pfm Member
Speak for yourself.
Audio is a partially-complete science in the service of art. 'art' on its own is meaningless without a subjective observer.
One can contest this, or merely discuss this, until Armageddon. It is all pointless.
Brian
Eating fat, staying slim
Yes, I know. It was spot on.
sergeauckland
pfm Member
No it's not!
Audio Engineering is well understood, and has been since the 1960s. We knew that transistor amplifiers wouldn't be great until complementary-symmetry transistors allowed crossover distortion to be overcome. We understood that LP replay was badly flawed, but commercially, reel-to-reel tape wasn't going to be domestically acceptable, and when CD replay became available, there was a whole new mathematics to understand. As CD and digital generally, have been with us for close on 30 years, we have a detailed understanding of the engineering issues required to achieve transparent A-D and D-A conversion.
With audio engineering, we have a full understanding of the technical issues with the equipment. We have now to find a way of getting the soundfield reproduced adequately in the home, but that has become a design, cost, domestic acceptability issue far more than an engineering one. Loudspeakers have to get smaller and less obtrusive, and have to be better integrated into the building so they're not so visible. Electronics has to handle a wider range of sources, and the future is the cloud, and streaming technologies.
S.
Tony L
Administrator
Yet loudspeakers are hopeless and barely pass any credible definition of the word high-fidelity, and as everything upstream has to exit through such a flawed window I'd argue the whole thing was an art - it is all a question of balancing out imperfection and finding a compromise you can accept.
Space is the Place
pfm Member
I could agree more that's why i've started to use cable elevators, i tried lots of different types but these ones are definitely best! Its like Lil' Kim is in the room with me, the leading edge transients of her booty claps have be heard to be believed.
Patrick Dixon
Imagineer
You miss the point: we need to understand what presses our buttons in order to set the parameters for what is essential in a music reproduction system. Otherwise we're just stuck with this flat from 20Hz - 20KHz stuff, which doesn't seem to provide all the answers.
If we're at all scientific, we ought to be wondering why people seem to think they get more pleasure from some seemingly unimportant aspect of their system, rather than just sticking our fingers in our ears and shouting "they must be deluded" increasingly louder.
Undoubtedly there are some snake-oil sellers out there, but not all of the unexplained stuff is nonsense (IMV) - even if I don't have 'proof'.
sergeauckland
pfm Member
Firstly, loudspeakers are a lot better now than ever before. Frequency responses can be +-2dB from LF up to 20kHz, and distortion even at LF can be below 1%. In technical terms, good loudspeakers are now becoming comparable with amplifiers, and a lot better than some expensive valve amps. What we can't yet do anything like adequately, is to recreate the 3D soundfield around an audio event. It is still essentially 1D (along a line L to R) with a limited amount of depth if the recording is very carefully done. However, these limitation are known, and work is going on at Research institutes like Fraunhoffer to find solutions. So far, all solutions have not found domestic acceptabiity, even Ambisonics, which came close, was a problem as it needed a very large room if the tetrahedral loudspeaker arrangement was to be used.
Even if the hardware problem of creating a soundfield is solved, it will require suitable recordings, and as pretty much the whole music industry is now chasing mobile users, the idea of sitting in a dedicated room and listening for an evening looks distinctly passe.
S.
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